


Making Up Isn't So Hard to Do

by katayla



Category: Psych
Genre: Community: schmoop_bingo, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-25
Updated: 2010-07-25
Packaged: 2017-10-10 19:35:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/103471
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katayla/pseuds/katayla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The aftermath of Shawn and Juliet's first fight.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Making Up Isn't So Hard to Do

**Author's Note:**

> Set in the nice little place in my head where Shawn and Juliet are a couple. Written for the prompt "first fight – making up" (wild card) for [](http://community.livejournal.com/schmoop_bingo/profile)[**schmoop_bingo**](http://community.livejournal.com/schmoop_bingo/).

  
Their first fight started when Shawn stole Juliet's case notes. It escalated into accusations about him caring more about work than their relationship, flipped to charges of _her_ caring more about work than their relationship and ended with her screaming at him to get out of her apartment.

(They'd squabbled before. She'd never been so blind that she hadn't seen Shawn's annoying qualities. But she'd never been truly angry at him before, couldn't remember the last time she'd _ever_ been truly angry at anyone.)

And now she was sitting on her couch and she _swore_ her dog was giving her reproachful looks. (She was also pretty sure the dog only loved Shawn because Shawn fed him treats when he thought Juliet wasn't looking. He said his psychic powers made him particularly sensitive to animals. At the time, she'd found it adorable, but now she just wished the damn dog would curl up with her.)

"He started it," she said.

The dog closed his eyes. Juliet sighed. She had a feeling she'd get about the same response from anyone else. Carlton would say he told her so, Gus would be on Shawn's side before he even heard the story and Shawn had charmed her other friends so throughly that they'd probably be on his side, too.

It wasn't _fair_. She was the successful police detective, while he glided through life expecting everything to work out for him. (And it _did_. He was always right, every woman he met fell for him and he had a best friend Juliet was pretty sure would do literally anything for him.)

Juliet sighed again and pulled a pillow to her chest. She couldn't expect Shawn to change just because things had changed between them. And maybe he shouldn't expect her to change either.

Which basically left them where they'd always been, caught between attraction and the knowledge of everything that could go wrong. Or left _her_ in the same place she'd always been, at least. She knew Shawn wasn't as happy-go-lucky as he pretended to be, had observed enough of his and his father's relationship to get that growing up wasn't easy for him, but he still seemed to leave the hard stuff to everyone else. Solve the crimes, stick her and Carlton with the paperwork. Make a joke, leave Gus to explain the reality of a situation. Leave her to fix the relationship?

But she'd known what she was signing up for. If she didn't do anything tonight, Shawn would probably show up at the station tomorrow and pretend nothing was wrong. Either pretend they'd never been anything more than friends or follow her home and . . . where _was_ he sleeping tonight anyway?

She called Gus.

"No, he hasn't turned up here," Gus said. "Everything okay?"

It was so tempting to tell him everything. She knew he'd make excuses for Shawn, but he'd also tell her what to do, how to make things right. But wasn't that cheating? She couldn't rely on Gus to make her relationship with Shawn work. Sometimes she thought of them as a package deal, but she was pretty sure she needed to have a piece of Shawn that was just hers.

Maybe Gus felt some of that, too, because when she responded with a too-glib, "Everything's fine!", all he said was, "Try the Psych office."

Gus was right, of course, and Juliet should've figured it out herself. Shawn's motorcycle was parked haphazardly in front. She tried the door, which was unlocked and she should really give Shawn a lecture about that. You'd think he'd have learned the value of locking doors.

"Hi Jules!" Shawn leaned against his desk and, maybe even just a month earlier, she would've been fooled by it. It sounded nearly the same as every other greeting he'd ever given her, as if her walking into the Psych office at one in the morning was perfectly normal, as if his _being_ in the Pysch office at one in the morning was perfectly normal.

She used to wonder if he ever had bad moods. Which was silly. _Everyone_ had bad moods. But he would burst into the station or onto a crime scene and smile and make quips and . . . she just hadn't been able to imagine him as anything other than happy.

But he wouldn't quite meet her in the eye and he fidgeted a little where he stood and maybe Juliet wasn't psychic, but she was a detective and knew a little about reading people.

"Do you . . . have a case?" Shawn asked, when she didn't say anything.

Juliet stared at him. "Do I—?"

Shawn shrugged. "You know, people come into the Psych office, they generally have cases. Important cases! That's why it's important to keep it manned at all hours of the night and day."

Juliet could've let it pass, almost did, but then she stopped herself. This would never work if she let him get away with everything. She walked all the way in and leaned against Gus's desk, facing Shawn.

"Especially when you get kicked out of your girlfriend's apartment?"

"Well, you know," Shawn said. "Two birds, one stone . . . ."

"I see," Juliet said.

"Very important cases," Shawn said. "I take my detective work very seriously and—"

He cut off, maybe remembering how their fight had started.

Juliet searched for something else to say. She should've thought this through more. Maybe made notecards. She'd bought a multicolored pack the other day. Perfect for color coordinating what she would say, his likely response and so on.

"I didn't mean to—It's _good_—I'm glad you take it seriously."

Shawn picked up a pen from his desk and began twirling it between his fingers. "You know, Jules, this might surprise you, but I've never been accused of taking work too seriously before."

And it was another one of those moments Juliet had finally started to recognize. When Shawn wanted someone to follow his lead, skip over the important stuff, and go with the joke.

Which, of course, was part of the problem. Nearly everyone in his life let him get away with that.

"I know it's important to you," Juliet said. Shawn opened his mouth to say something, but she rushed on. "You help us so much, Shawn. Has anyone ever told you that?"

Shawn didn't even try to respond to that, just slouched down further and began throwing his pen in the air and catching it.

"You see things we miss," Juliet said. "It's just—"

And Shawn met her eyes now. He didn't move or say anything; He just looked at her.

"This can't only be about work," Juliet said. "Because, if it is—"

Then it didn't matter. Then she wasn't any different from the women he flirted with to get information.

Shawn started throwing his pen up in the air again. Juliet sighed. He was right. No one ever accused him of taking work—_anything_—seriously and maybe she'd been fooling herself all along.

She pushed herself up from the desk, getting ready to leave. It would probably be better if they left it right here. Went back to being friends.

"You're the only one who really likes me," Shawn said.

And now it was Juliet's turn to stare. Not that he looked at her, of course. He just kept tossing the pen around.

"I mean, Gus and I have been friends forever, so he's stuck with me and my dad, I guess he's stuck with me, too. The chief only lets me hang around because I solve cases and Lassie—" He laughed. "Well, you know what Lassie thinks of me."

Shawn put the pen down on the desk and walked over to sit next to Juliet. "But you, Jules, you . . . I mean, getting a woman to like me is easy—Does that sound bad?"

"Uh-huh."

"But getting her to _keep_ liking me, after those first five minutes have passed and she wants more from me than—Well, mostly they get disappointed and start yelling at me."

"I did that."

Shawn shrugged. "But it took you five years. And you still kind of like me."

"Oh, I do, do I?"

"Can't fool a psychic, Jules." He nudged her shoulder with his and shot her a hopeful look.

Juliet smiled at him. "I'd invite you to come home with me, but I wouldn't want you to neglect your work here."

"Well, I wouldn't want to take work too seriously," Shawn said. "In fact, maybe I should take the night off."

"But all those important cases," Juliet said. "What will happen to them?"

"They'll wait," Shawn said.

"Okay," Juliet said.

"Okay?"

And Juliet leaned over to kiss him.

"Okay."


End file.
